


Long Way Down

by manic_intent



Category: Fallout 4
Genre: M/M, That pre-Canon fic speculating about Maxson's past, them soldier boys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-07
Updated: 2015-12-07
Packaged: 2018-05-05 11:59:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5374487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manic_intent/pseuds/manic_intent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rumour tended to spread like wildfire in the Citadel, and by the second day, Arthur had heard at least six different accounts of the tragic/heroic result of Knight Danse’s three week long op to save Knight Cutler. Even <i>Sarah</i> had been impressed. </p><p>Arthur wasn’t entirely sure what to think about that. A few months ago he had compiled a secret list on his terminal about Things That Have Clearly Impressed Sentinel Lyons, and it was depressingly short:</p><p>1. Restore clean water to the Capital Wasteland - Wanderer<br/>2. Destroy the Enclave - Wanderer </p><p>He supposed that he could now add, </p><p>3. Spend three weeks spearheading ultimately futile search into super mutant territory - Knight Danse</p>
            </blockquote>





	Long Way Down

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [长路漫漫（Long way down）](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7945591) by [qingtan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/qingtan/pseuds/qingtan)



> Them soldier boys. :/ 
> 
> Maybe there’s something wrong with me. IRL I’m one of those treehugger pacifists: no war, no guns, save the whales. In game… my LIs always tend to be people like Alistair, Cullen, Garrus… now Danse and if I could’ve done it, Maxson. Probably the only exception was Kaidan, and that’s probably because Garrus was also an option. D: 
> 
> This fic is mainly to think about how Arthur went from this http://theon-stark.tumblr.com/post/134167931316 to some sort of bearded machismo rageman. I mean. Usually when we go through adolescent angst we maybe get high or go on benders or write angsty blog posts. Declaring war on all comers seems to be a bit of an escalation…

I.

Rumour tended to spread like wildfire in the Citadel, and by the second day, Arthur had heard at least six different accounts of the tragic/heroic result of Knight Danse’s three week long op to save Knight Cutler. Even _Sarah_ had been impressed.

Arthur wasn’t entirely sure what to think about that. A few months ago he had compiled a secret list on his terminal about Things That Have Clearly Impressed Sentinel Lyons, and it was depressingly short:

1\. Restore clean water to the Capital Wasteland - Wanderer  
2\. Destroy the Enclave - Wanderer 

He supposed that he could now add, 

3\. Spend three weeks spearheading ultimately futile search into super mutant territory - Knight Danse 

But even that felt depressingly impossible. Great deeds all seemed to fall to those who were _older_. Being twelve was, in Arthur’s experience to date, still highly inconvenient at the best of times. 

Squire duties kept Arthur busy all morning, scrubbing down the Hospital, relaying messages, helping Gunny with inventory: being a Maxson didn’t mean _that_ much at all in the Citadel, something that Arthur had decided that he liked. Mostly. The other squires didn’t talk to him much, and it had gotten worse after that one time he had accidentally shot Sarah (just a little!) when they had gone out on a patrol. So now during the hour break for lunch, Arthur usually crept up through an old hatch he had found in the B ring, one that led up eventually to a room that overlooked the Bailey. It had big windows, a view of the outside, and more importantly, some privacy. Arthur kept a notebook and a pencil here, as well as a box of mementoes that he wanted to keep secret. Things he didn’t want to get teased about by the other Squires.

Today, still smarting after another telling-off by Scribe Rothchild, Arthur didn’t notice that the ladder up to his secret loft was an inch out of place until it was too late. As he pulled himself up into the room, muttering under his breath, Arthur nearly yelped and fell all the way back down as he noticed that he wasn’t alone. 

Fingers like iron bars caught him by the arm and hauled him up with no apparent effort, setting him down safely on the stone floor. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you, Squire.” 

Arthur stared up into Knight Danse’s face, blinking dumbly. Honest, open and handsome, Arthur had seen Danse draw admiring glances from other Brothers, male and female alike. The fresh scar over his eye, the only visible memento of his three week search, was still a fresh, ugly pink, and his hair had been neatly buzzed back down, close to his skull. Danse was at least ten years older than Arthur and it showed: he was tall and broad-shouldered, hard muscle straining the orange Brotherhood uniform that he was wearing. 

“Knight Danse,” Arthur said, and wished that his voice didn’t sound so much like a squeak. 

“Sorry,” Danse repeated again, earnestly, then he blinked and studied Arthur’s face more closely. Resigned, Arthur waited. He knew what was coming next. “You’re… Arthur Maxson, aren’t you?” 

“Uh-huh,” Arthur confirmed, unenthusiastically. As much as being a Maxson didn’t exempt him from Squire duties and scoldings from Rothchild, sometimes other adults reacted weirdly. Especially the first time. He’d run the gamut from patronising amusement to unsettling awe to outright suspicion.

“Ah,” Danse said wryly, and this was new. _Sympathy_. “Sorry,” he said again. “I thought this room was abandoned. And uh. I found this notebook, I-“ 

Arthur hurriedly snatched his book out of Danse’s hands, red-faced, and put it back under his box. “That was private!”

“I didn’t realize! I’m sorry!” 

“Did you take anything else?” Arthur quickly checked the box. 

“No. I didn’t even look in the box. I swear.” 

Outrage ceded swiftly into sheer embarrassment. Danse had seen his _book_ , with all its stupid poems and stupid sketches. Worse, Arthur had shouted at a _Knight_. “Sorry,” Arthur said sullenly. “For shouting. That was out of line. May I be dismissed?” 

“No wait,” Danse said quickly, then he exhaled. “Can we start over? I really just came up here to get some privacy. Guess you do too, right? So. Don’t worry too much about my being a Knight or you being a Squire. I just. Wanted some quiet for a while.” 

“Oh.” Arthur said, surprised. “Why?” 

“Everyone out there, they just either want to talk about how they knew Cutler, or how I was right to shoot him, or about super mutants. I just. I want to remember him quietly. Without all that noise.”

Arthur studied Danse uncertainly. He wasn’t sure what to say, either. The reports were the same on the facts. Danse had found Knight Cutler infected with the FEV virus and as such, had given him a clean death. Eventually, when Danse just moved away, to glance out of the window, Arthur dithered between heading back down the hatch or saying something, and eventually swallowed his questions, with some difficulty. Nor did he retreat. This was _his_ space, and as far as Arthur was concerned, Danse was the intruder. He picked up his book and sat down next to his box, and when he flipped to the latest page he found, to his irritation, that Danse was looking at him curiously.

“What?” Arthur asked resentfully.

“Nothing. I just. Well.” Danse looked away, biting his lip. 

“You don’t want to talk about what happened, right?” Arthur pointed out, irritated. “So I’m not going to talk about it. But this is _my_ spot. I’m not leaving.” 

“Ah.” To Arthur’s surprise, Danse smiled, and the smile lit up his face, softened his eyes. “Thank you.” 

Arthur nodded curtly, pulling up his knees to balance his book on his thighs, so Danse couldn’t see what he was doing. 

“Don’t the squires usually spend breaks together?” 

“Yes?” Arthur asked pointedly. 

Danse studied him for a while, then he looked out of the window again. “Must be hard. Being the outsider.” He didn’t seem to notice Arthur tensing up. “When I joined up… Cutler and I were the only Wastelanders in our year. Hell. We were too old to be Initiates - we joined up as Senior Squires - and we were the only ones who hadn’t come up through the ranks. So. I think for the first year or so? Nobody in our year would talk to us unless they had to.” 

“That’s…” Arthur trailed off for a moment. “Unfortunate.”

“Problem’s still there,” Danse said wryly. “Not even the Sentinel likes Wastelanders very much.” 

Arthur bristled, now on the defensive. “No doubt she has her reasons.” 

“Probably. But being in the Brotherhood has been the most rewarding experience of my life. I’m glad that I got a chance to be recruited. We can’t all be ‘pureblooded’,” Danse said mildly. 

“I didn’t mean that,” Arthur mumbled, shamefaced. “It’s not meant to matter once you’re in the Brotherhood. _Bound by steel_. There’s no class system. Not meant to be one, anyway,” Arthur said quickly. “I have to work up through the ranks like everyone else. I’m the same here as everyone else.” 

“I don’t think so,” Danse said gently, again with that wry sympathy. “And you - and the other Squires - know it too. I know what it’s like to be alone. And I guess. All I can say is… eventually it’ll pass. Children can be cruel to each other.”

Arthur narrowed his eyes, suspicious, but Danse had glanced back out over the Bailey at the sound of gatling fire, and after a long moment, Arthur decided to say nothing. Sympathy wasn’t something that he was looking for either. _Especially_ not from a grown-up.

1.0.

Innocence tended to die quickly in this brave new world: for some more viscerally than most. Danse did not ever remember a time when he was innocent. Childhood had been an unrelenting memory of scattered brutality and wretchedness, and by the time he had qualified into the Brotherhood he was already a killer. He had killed to defend his scavenger hoard; he had killed in self-defense, he had killed for food. Before the Brotherhood he had lived with an animal’s sense of simplicity, evolving between hunger and thirst and shelter.

Now he watched innocence die across the bullet-pocked ground of the Bailey. The Brotherhood had never bothered to shield its squires from the reality of the world, and so no one bothered to shoo the children out of the courtyard as Elder Sarah Lyons’ remains and those of her team were brought back. Mangled power armour had been partially pried apart, arms dislocated and wrenched away. It had been clear that part of her had been eaten, gnawed on by something with large teeth that had cracked her ribs for marrow and chewed away part of her face. The squires stared, wide-eyed, some quickly turning away, sickened, rushing out somewhere private to throw up, perhaps, or weep, some squeezing closer, impressed by gore. 

Beyond the ranks of sober Scribes and Knights working to separate the remains of Lyons’ strike team from their gear, standing apart from the other squires as though frozen to the spot was Squire Maxson, watching. He was so pale that it looked like he was close to death, himself, his lips pressed into a bloodless line. Disbelief ran the gauntlet of shock to horror and back, and grief settled in slow encasing stages over Maxson’s face, crumpling it down. Then he turned, and fled. 

Danse didn’t know what pushed him to follow. No one noticed, anyway. With the Elder dead, the Brotherhood was leaderless, with no clear successor, and the Proctors were already beginning to squabble between themselves. By the time he pulled himself up into Maxson’s little loft, the squire was already curled in a corner, head buried in his arms, knees drawn up. Danse waited, for a moment, uncertain, but when Maxson didn’t even look up, he hauled himself all the way up, then sat down beside the kid, his back to the wall. 

“Go away,” Maxson muttered, his voice muffled and thick with sobs.

“Maybe I need some quiet as well.” Danse said gently. Maxson didn’t reply, not until the noise had faded from the Bailey: the business of salvaging gear was done, and the bodies would be cremated, the dogtags sent to storage, their manner of death and names sent to the West Coast to be noted into the Codex. Death was addressed in the Brotherhood with militant efficiency. 

“She shouldn’t have gone,” Maxson said quietly, then. 

“She was the Elder. She could do what she liked.”

“Exactly. She was the Elder. She shouldn’t have gone.” 

“She was a Sentinel before she was an Elder,” Danse pointed out. 

It had been obvious for weeks that Elder Lyons had been itching to return to the field, spending long hours practicing in the Bailey instead of attending to Elder matters. The Proctors had grumbled. Paladin Williams, whose company Danse had been assigned to, had been philosophical. ‘She just needs to warm her gun out there for a bit and she’ll be fine’, Williams had said, when they’d gone out themselves for a separate op. When they had returned, Sarah Lyons was dead. 

“She had responsibilities… and now this - for what?” Maxson whispered. “Some dirty settlers who all died anyway.”

Danse said nothing. Paladin Williams hadn’t spoken of Lyon’s op with approval either. ‘Apple doesn’t fall far from the fucking tree’, was what she used to like to say about Sarah’s tendency to send out companies to protect settlements. Sarah Lyons had been a bit of an Outcast sympathiser, but where it mattered, she was every inch her father’s daughter, and it had killed her after all. 

“But the super mutants are getting bolder,” Maxson added. “There’s more’of them now, did you know? I heard Rothchild say so. They’ve been intentionally infecting others. Rothchild says it happens now and then. They get a leader, a ‘master’, who’s bigger and badder and smarter than the rest. Kind of like a war chief. That’s when the trouble starts. For everyone.”

“Rothchild knows…?”

“All the op reports go through him. He says there’s an obvious pattern. It always starts like this. A Horde.” 

A super mutant war. Danse grimaced. “I’ll speak to Paladin Williams. If the Paladins get together-“

“Nothing’s going to happen for a while,” Maxson predicted. “The Proctors all just wanna be Elder. Until they agree on someone or West Coast names someone, nothing is gonna be done.” 

Later, Danse spoke to Williams anyway. His commanding officer was a tall woman, taller than Danse, proportionally large in every way: her power armour had to be specially made for her. She frowned at him from where she had been polishing it against the workstation, straightening to her feet, her earth-dark skin wet with sweat.

“Where’d you hear that from, Knight?” 

“The… squires were talking, sir,” Danse said, a little evasively.

Williams snorted. “Bullshit. You talked to that weird little kid, didn’t you. The Maxson boy. Him and his stories. Don’t bother. His mamma sent him here to toughen him up. Hasn’t fucking worked. So much for ‘eternal steel’, or whatever they say he’s made of. Forget it and bunker down, Danse. When there’s a power struggle in High Command, you don’t wanna be in range when the shit hits the fan.” 

Danse tried Rothchild, who was harried, upset, and clearly worried over the upcoming power struggle. “A Horde?” he asked, distracted. “We’re not quite there yet by far. I’ve heard a name crop up in some ops. A ‘Shepherd’. But we haven’t seen any dramatic escalation in their numbers, or tribes coming together. These things, most of the time they work out to nothing. Super mutants follow only the strong. And they tear each other to pieces just as often as they’d listen to another one of their kind.”

And that was that. Williams kept her company busy on combat drills, sometimes in miniature wargames with other companies, and if Maxson seemed to be a familiar face out at the Bailey, usually practicing with a pistol or a rifle… anyone could practice if they wanted to, comical as it was to see the kid walk around with a rifle that was only a head shorter than he was. “Recoil would knock him off a nest,” observed Knight Ursula, the sniper in Danse’s company, during a break in a wargame, and Danse was the only one who didn’t laugh. Was Maxson…? Surely not. He was still a squire. 

Proctor Elijah was eventually named to Elder, and he immediately scaled down all ops, concentrating on fortifications and guard drills. Over the years, Elijah was quickly replaced by a more hawkish Tania Mayors, when the Paladins started to chafe loudly at being confined to base, then by Kaperski, a Paladin who was a deadlock choice, who clearly had no interest or experience at higher command. Ops were cancelled, or sent out under-resourced, in-fighting was rife. The Citadel felt like a powder keg, waiting for a spark.

And then the Maxson kid disappeared. 

The chaos that erupted was immediate. The Citadel was searched from corner to corner, as much as the Paladins grumbled and the Proctors blamed each other. Rothchild was frantic. A tally of items were found missing: a pistol, a couple of rifles, ammunition, a combat knife and a duffel bag with travel rations. Maxson had wiped his personal terminal and burned his notebooks. 

“Deserted,” Ursula said at night, when the company was bunking down. 

“Keep that to yourself, Knight,” Williams said sharply. 

Ursula rolled her eyes, but she held her silence until Williams departed for the evening Paladin meeting. “Think it all got to him,” she said then, when they were all cleaning out their gear together in their company room, perched on her bunk with her pistol disassembled on a cloth stretched over her knees. “His bigshot name.”

“He had a crush on her,” observed Ummon, the youngest of their company and a Junior Knight, only a squire himself two months ago, a skinny kid with his black hair shaved all the way down to bronzed skin. “The Elder who died. Sarah Lyons.”

“Fuck. Seeing her come back half eaten like that?” Knight Astlin shook her head pityingly. As the second oldest member of their company and close to Paladin promotion herself, Astlin had a battlefield calm that served her well as a marksman and tactician, and she wore her hair in heavy, tawny brown dreads. “Must’ve been hard.” 

“It’s hard for everyone out here,” Ursula shrugged. “You don’t see us turning the Citadel upside down for anyone else who might have gone on a little walk. Fucking waste of time. I bet he’s just hiding out a few days away somewhere. He’ll come back when he’s out of food.” 

“What do you think, Danse?” Astlin asked wryly. “ _You_ turned the Capital Wasteland upside down once. Looking for Knight Cutler.”

“Shit, Danse.” Ursula peered under her bunk - Danse had the bunk under hers. She scrunched her face up into an uncomfortable grimace. “I didn’t mean to say that what _you_ did was a waste of time or anything. I would’a done the same if I were you. Called out High Command on their bullshit.“

“No offense taken,” Danse said quickly. He was reassembling his laser rifle, screwing his personal mods back on. “I’m not sure. I don’t know Maxson well.” 

“Nobody does,” Ummon quipped. “He didn’t mix with the rest of us. Like uh, Paladin Williams said. Not a bad shot though, few years back, some raiders attacked his company when they were out on fuel recon, heard he got a few confirmed kills. Still. He was a bit of a weird kid-”

“However,” Danse added, before Ummon could continue. “I think I know where he’s gone.” He set his rifle on his knees, thoughtful now. “I think he’s out for revenge. He’s gone to kill the Shepherd.” 

“Shit,” Ummon said quietly, after a long pause.

“That’s not funny.” Ursula said sharply. “We know the Shepherd’s out there. That last settlement they hit? I heard the radio report, fresh out of Jefferson. It was bad.” 

“Gathering the tribes,” Astlin shook her head slowly, dreads skittering over her uniform. “If it was Owyn, we’d have mustered up long ago. Sent vertibirds on sweeps until we found the colony and bombed it to hell. War chiefs are _bad_ news. And kidnapping settlers instead of murdering them on the spot and carrying them off as meat? Worse. They’re infecting people. Building up.” 

“The Paladins are holding daily meetings,” Danse pointed out. “Something’s got to give.”

“Those?” Astlin rolled her eyes. “Shit. Danse, if you ever get to Paladin? You’ll find out they ain’t all the same. There are field officers, like Williams, and there’s desk jockeys, like Emmerson. And what the field officers want and the desk jockeys want are worlds apart. Nothing’s gonna move. Especially since High Command ain’t gonna move.”

Williams returned flushed and annoyed, proving Astlin’s point. “They can’t keep this from West Coast forever,” she said brusquely. “And once it gets out, heads are gonna roll.”

“Why? It’s just a _kid_.” Ursula growled. “People acting like the fuckin’ Messiah’s gone missing, what the fuck?” 

“It’s not who he is,” Williams snapped. “It’s what this _looks like_. Especially on top of how _glorious_ our leadership has been recently.” 

“Does it matter?” Ummon asked out aloud. “West Coast cut us off.”

“It does matter, if we ever want to get that situation reversed. Obviously,” Ursula rolled her eyes. Ummon flushed and mumbled something inaudible, embarrassed.

“Danse thinks that Maxson’s gone after Shepherd,” Astlin said. 

Williams glanced sharply at Ummon, who flushed and raised his hands. “I don’t know! I never talked to him.” 

“Was just a thought.” Danse said evenly. “I’ve seen him at the Bailey training everyday. With a pistol. And a sniper rifle.”

“He’s right,” Ursula joined in, to Danse’s surprise. “The kid’s there all the time other than the mornings. I’ve seen him too.”

“Shit,” Williams scowled. “That’s fucking fantastic. There’s no way I can convince all the other Paladins to move as a bloc on just circumstantial evidence. But if you’re both right-”

“Hard evidence would be the Maxson kid either getting into a body bag or turned into a mutie,” Astlin pointed out dryly. “Won’t _that_ make West Coast happy.” 

_Turned into a mutie_. Danse shuddered. “Get Scribe Rothchild to send us out on fuel recon. He can still okay resource runs. Maybe we’ll just take the scenic route each time.”

“Knight Danse, I like how your mind works,” Williams said slowly, thoughtfully. 

“Five of us against a Master and a horde?” Ursula said out aloud, then she smirked. “Well fucking bring it _on_.”

They didn’t find Maxson. Not the first day, not the next, not even when Williams got the other field ops Paladins into the game. The squire had likely been smart enough to find Wastelander gear early on, and had probably joined up with one of the many trade caravans that liked to pass through Brotherhood territory, where they could do a bit of barter and could be assured of a fairly safer journey. 

West Coast found out, and Kaperski had to resign, probably to her relief. With no named Elder, the Proctors fell back to squabbling. Danse found that he didn’t really care. Nor did the other field companies. Looking for Maxson had gone from being an annoying chore to a sort of shared obsession. While they were out in the field, at least, they were away from politics. The field Paladins stopped going to the gen meetings and held their own, comparing notes, triangulating the maps, doing calculations. They split jobs. Una’s team would keep checking the road. A couple of Scribes were sent to Rivet City, just in case, even Megaton. The rest of them would try and find the Shepherd. And although none of them knew it yet, the Brotherhood of Steel was just about to change forever.

II.

Arthur had spent the first two weeks on the road thoroughly homesick, and twice, had nearly turned back. The slow caravan he had joined up with had been headed for Megaton, and he had spent a couple of days there, ghosting around bars, listening to rumours, before he had spotted two Scribes in their bright orange Brotherhood suits and had known that it was time to leave. He didn’t want to go back to the Citadel yet. Not while the Shepherd still lived. Besides, he had already learned what he wanted.

The Shepherd most likely hadn’t been the super mutant that had killed and eaten Sarah. But there was no point just breaking a twig off a tree. Better to slag the roots and salt the earth. 

From Megaton he headed northwards, following caravans where he could, avoiding main roads when he couldn’t. Sometimes he would see the occasional vertibird, high overhead, but it never stopped. In Megaton Arthur had traded one of the Brotherhood rifles for a young brahmin, and if the Brotherhood was looking for him, he guessed that from the air he’d look just like any other Wastelander, out with a yearling, loaded up with salvage. 

_If_ they were looking for him. Arthur found that he didn’t really care either way. Technically, he had deserted. He didn’t care about that either. Vengeance had driven him this far, and it was too late for regrets. When he slept at night, he still saw Sarah’s face, eaten away. When he woke in the morning, sometimes he was angry all over again. Not just at the mutants. At the Brotherhood itself. What Arthur had once been told was his birthright had grown so corrupt that it made him sick to be there. A snake eating its own tail, that was what the Brotherhood had become. Ouroboros.

Somedays it felt now like he was just angry all the time. But it was a clean sort of anger. It cleared his mind. He had been such a stupid kid - Arthur saw that now. Distracted over things that never even mattered. Now he felt like he was the tip of a spear. He would have his revenge. It was too late to turn back. 

And besides, he had _worked_ for this for _years_. He had read as much military strategy as he could find in the Brotherhood archives, then studied similar ops. He had trained in weapons appropriate to working as a single operative behind enemy lines. Finding a way out of the Citadel had been the next step. Arthur had been sneaking in and out of an old tunnel since he was thirteen. Once this had even nearly killed him - he had been practicing outside the Citadel, near Hubris Comics, when a deathclaw had come hunting. Somehow Arthur had managed to wedge himself up high enough that the creature couldn’t reach him, and from his vantage point, do enough damage while it roared and snarled and gouged up futilely at bricks. It finally bled out and died, but it did get a swipe in across his face and chest, cracking ribs. Inches lower and it would've gutted him. 

Arthur hadn’t wanted to explain, in case Rothchild put a stop on his plans. Stimpacks had stopped the bleeding, and when he finally got back to the Citadel, he had managed to get to Sawbones unseen, and used Rothchild’s lab password on the medic-robot after it had patched him up to cover his tracks. As to his face, when asked, Arthur simply murmured some story about falling down the stairs. He had more important plans, and it suited him to remain a squire, underfoot everywhere and ignored. 

Big Town had been savaged - that was what Arthur had learned in Megaton. But when he came close, he noticed that it had been an understatement. The wall around the settlement had been blown to fragments, possibly by missiles, and the town had been flattened, partly literally. Smoke still rose in an oily, thick cloud from one of the houses. It looked like the settlers had just been kidnapped - Arthur didn’t see any evidence of recent death. A vertibird sat on a razed field, and a couple of Knights in power armour were ambling about. Arthur frowned to himself and walked on, pulling his hood over his head. Time to move on. If he was found now, Maxson name or not, the Knights were just going to drag home a runaway squire.

He kept to the trade routes this time, slowed down. The brahmin turned out to be good company. It had a sweet nature and was extremely trusting. Arthur named it Troy, and tried not to get too attached. After all, he had plans for the beast. 

Further north was when it got dicey. The Shepherd was possibly in one of two places: Germantown Police HQ, or Paradise Falls: the slavers’ compound had gone dark over a year ago, and the rumour in Megaton was that the super mutants from the nearby HQ had spread outwards. In the end, it didn’t really matter. All Arthur really wanted, after all, was to provoke the Shepherd out into the open. Once he was well into super mutant territory, he found a good vantage spot inside an old gas station and staked Troy out on the road. Then he settled down to wait. 

He killed a patrol in the night. It was as easy in the firing range as it was out in the field, just as Sarah had shown him once. _Take a breath, hold it in, concentrate, brace for the kick. Do it again. And again. Don’t try for fancy headshots. Go for centre mass. Don’t feel anger, or joy or hatred, or excitement. Feel nothing. That’s when you’d get a good kill._

In the morning, he looted the bodies, untied Troy, and headed off to find another spot. One week in, Arthur started to lose count. It didn’t matter anyway. None of the ones he had killed were the Shepherd. When he slept at night, he still saw Sarah’s face.

Annoyingly, it wasn’t just the super mutants who were taking notice. Vertibirds were flying overhead here more often: it wasn’t uncommon to see one a day, coming and going. Arthur continued to lie low. Sooner or later, someone was going to deem all that recon a waste of fuel. Even for a Maxson. He didn’t really care if he was going to survive the op anyway. 

A week and a half in, to Arthur’s annoyance, super mutants shot Troy before actually investigating. Arthur managed to down them in turn, but it was a bit of a setback. Without bait, preying on patrols was going to get dicier. The next night, he was nearly caught - he’d missed his shot and a brute had charged into range and up into the old water tower Arthur was shooting from; thankfully, the brute got tangled up in the tripwire Arthur had left on the stairs, given Arthur enough time to empty his pistol into its head. He had fled to an old gas station and spent the night huddled under an old workbench, cold and hungry and shaking from the comedown, his arms still stinking of gunpowder. Night after, he was wiser about his targets. 

Thankfully, given his dwindling supplies, the guerrilla approach was starting to bear fruit. The tribes were fighting amongst themselves: already fractious, now they were outright belligerent. Arthur could hear scattered gunfire from the distance, coming from both Paradise Falls and Georgetown. It was time. Soon the Shepherd would have to go on patrols itself, or lose all authority. Arthur began to spend the days in either one of a handful of safehouses, building very basic mines from bottlecaps and shrapnel. He’d learned that much from all the years he’d spent in Rothchild’s lab.

In the end, there had been nothing particularly heroic about how Arthur killed the Shepherd, not like how stories tended to work out. The Shepherd was a larger-than-usual super mutant, though not quite behemoth-sized, one who had, for whatever reason, decided to paint its head from the shoulders up a stark bone white. Around its shoulders it wore freshly-severed super mutant heads, strung together by wire, dripping dark fluid against its belly and the animal hide that it wore around its waist. The Shepherd had a minigun, also painted white, and it had been alone, clearly intending to bring back the mutant hunter single-handedly.

The shrapnel mine that Arthur had seeded into the road had shredded the Shepherd’s legs from ankles up to knees. While the monster lay howling and bleeding to death on the road, flailing, Arthur had come out of his vantage point, jogged over, and watched quietly, just out of reach, as the Shepherd hissed and glared at him with hatred and pulled itself closer, thick fingers clawed into the soil. Once it was nearly at Arthur’s feet, Arthur had emptied a clip into the white-painted head, as calmly as he would’ve in the Bailey. Stood and watched the light fade out of the Shepherd’s eyes. 

On hindsight, he should’ve stayed hidden and used the rifle. Preoccupied, Arthur didn’t notice the patrol until it was upon him. There was a distant _crack_ , then something invisible seemed to punch Arthur hard in the shoulder, spinning him back and off his feet; his ears were ringing, the world seemed to be slowing down. Going into shock. He tried to crawl up, only for his leg to crumple. He’d taken a second shot - when? Impact in the distance - something had stepped on the bottlecap mine. A super mutant coming closer, swinging a nail-studded board. Arthur began to laugh, hoarsely, fumbling nervelessly with his pistol. Death had not held any particular fear for him ever since he had danced with a deathclaw and come out alive. If this was it-

Something shot the feet out from under the mutant, then its body convulsed on the ground as if from further impact. Arthur slumped onto his side, blinking. The world was going dark, fading into a dull roar that sounded, for a moment, very much like the engines of a vertibird-

2.0.

Danse was pulling bedside duty when Maxson finally woke up from all the drugs. As the squire groaned and started to thrash, Danse activated the bedside alert and then grabbed for Maxson’s arms. “Hey,” he said softly. “Hey. You’re home. Safe now.”

Maxson twisted against Danse for a moment, weakly, before blinking up and frowning. “Danse?” he whispered. 

“Yes. You’re back in the Citadel.” 

Maxson pushed at him again, gasping. “Got to - got to kill the Shepherd - not yet-“

“You got him, Maxson. Don’t you remember? You killed him. Hell, I think you killed more super mutants than most _companies_ manage in a whole _year_ -“ Danse paused as Rothchild burst into the room, pale and harried, checking Maxson’s pulse as Maxson startled to struggle again, then injecting something into his arm. Maxson went back to sleep, slowly, whimpering under his breath. 

“Still delirious,” Rothchild pressed a palm against Maxson’s neck. “Not to mention dehydrated and borderline malnourished.” He shook his head slowly, amazed, and checked Maxson’s IV drip. “Insane.”

“He did what he wanted to.”

“He’s still a child,” said the Scribe, though it was halfhearted. The same disbelieving awe sat heavy in Rothchild’s eyes. Danse had seen it all over the Citadel. 

“What happened to his face?” Danse asked. He hadn’t seen Maxson up close for years. 

“I think at the time he told me he fell down the stairs,” Rothchild said, sounding embarrassed, “And I took him at his word. But now that I’ve given him a full check up… that doesn’t hold water, not with the scars on his chest. There’s a blank in Sawbones’ records as well, authorised with my password, two years ago.” 

“Sawbones? Isn’t that thing glitchy?” Williams had always warned her company to avoid it.

“The Wanderer fixed it, I believe. But he’s still vulnerable to hacking,” Rothchild said sourly. “Creator knows what happened. At least it’s all healed up. Hell of a scar, though.” 

Days later, when Maxson woke again, he seemed calmer, blinking to focus. Danse was reading an issue of Guns and Bullets, and looked up when Maxson murmured, “Knight Danse.”

“Hello again.”

“Did I… The Shepherd?”

“Dead. Good work.” Danse bit down the _sir_ just in time. It wasn’t yet appropriate. “Unbelievable work, actually.”

Maxson smiled tiredly, and closed his eyes again. “Why’re you here? Prisoner watch?” 

“Prisoner?”

“I’m technically a deserter. I know what the rules are.” 

“Somehow I think High Command isn’t going to see it that way,” Danse said, and smiled as Maxson glanced at him in surprise. “Squire, I’m here because my company got bragging rights for finding you. Paladin Williams - my company leader - is off in the discussions. I think a field promotion is in order and she wants to make sure she’s involved.”

“She wants me in her company?” Maxson still looked a little lost, though he was frowning to himself, as though recalculating something in his head. 

Danse chuckled. “I think it’s going to be the other way around,” he predicted, but Maxson had already gone back to sleep, exhausted. Danse watched him for a while, unsurprised by the warmth that he felt, the protective _pride_. 

Here was the future of the Brotherhood. 

He glanced up at a faint knock on the door, and Ursula let herself in quietly. “No change?” she whispered. 

“He woke up briefly. Lucid now. Was tired and went back to sleep. What about upstairs?” Danse whispered back. 

“West Coast got a word in. Seems he’s going to be a Knight Captain.” Ursula could barely hide her glee. “All the field Paladins pretty much volunteered.”

“That much of a jump? He was only a squire-“ Danse blinked. He had thought - to Senior Paladin, perhaps-

“He’s a _Maxson_.”

“Seems to me like not long ago, _someone_ said he was ‘just a kid’,” Danse said, amused. 

“That’s _before_ I realized he was some sort of one-man- _army_. That’s the kind of leadership we need. High Command sitting on their hands when a Master is on the loose? No problems. He just goes out by himself to handle it. You hear the talk out in the B Ring? Everyone’s saying that steel bred true after all. He’s Roger Maxson reborn.”

Danse wasn’t entirely sure about all that. Maxson slept fitfully at best, twitching and whispering in his sleep. Sometimes he called a name. _Sarah_. The Elder’s death had damaged him, far more than anyone could have thought. “I think he still needs to rest for a while,” Danse said uncertainly. The super mutants were dead. What else would Maxson want? The boy was going to be bewildered by all the new attention, Danse decided. He could just see it now. The shy kid with the notebook of sketches, trying to curl into a corner. 

As it turned out, Danse was wrong after all. When Williams and Una explained Maxson’s new rank and responsibilities to him, the boy didn’t even blink. He was sitting up in bed, but only barely, and Danse was out in the corridor with Ursula and Astlin and a cluster of other Paladins and Knights. It felt a little like waiting for the Word of God, Danse thought for a moment, suddenly amused. He was going to bet that everyone waiting for the second coming of Roger Maxson was going to be disappointed. 

And then-

“Good,” Maxson said finally, his voice weak, but firm. “Paladin Una, pick two companies and clear out Paradise Falls and Georgetown HQ. I want to know where they were getting their FEV virus stores from. Those have to be destroyed. Anyone infected must be put down. Cleanly.”

“Yes sir.” 

“Once that is done,” Maxson added, as Una straightened up at attention. “The Brotherhood’s faced a greater problem for years. Far more dangerous than even the Shepherd. The Outcasts. I want to know exactly where their bases are. How many of them there are. Any intel about their movements all these years.” 

“Sir,” Williams said doubtfully, raising her eyebrows. “You want to… go after the Outcasts?” 

“Not to destroy them,” Maxson said wearily, closing his eyes. “They were once Brotherhood as well, bound to us by steel. I think it’s about time that they were brought back home.” He smiled thinly, with the flat calm of someone who no longer knew how to fear the future. “One way or the other.”

III.

Arthur pressed a gloved hand against the glass of the Prydwen’s viewport in the main command deck. Below, Adams AFB swarmed with activity: Brotherhood Scribes and Initiates scurrying around moving supply pods to waiting vertibirds. Behind him was a cacophonous echo of heavy power armour footsteps, lighter feet, commands, chatter, laughter. The Brotherhood of Steel was going to war.

“Sir.” 

Arthur didn’t turn. He could recognise Danse’s gentle, grave voice anywhere. “What is it, Paladin?”

Danse let out a soft laugh. “Never going to get used to hearing that, sir.” 

“You should have been promoted years ago,” Arthur said dismissively. “After you led that strike team. Yesterday was just a long-overdue rectification. How is Paladin Williams?”

“Not good,” Danse said quietly, coming up to stand beside him. “I came straight here from the Citadel via vertibird. They… if we could ask for a… if it’s appropriate-“

“Speak clearly, Paladin.”

“Paladin Williams,” Danse cleared his throat. “She’s dying. And if it’s all right. She’ll like to see you. Before the end.” 

“Of… of course. Lead the way.”

The damage that had been done to Paladin Williams was grisly. She was pale and sweating, and part of the sheets that should be tented where a leg should be lay flat. She breathed with terrible, wet gasps, her single remaining lung fighting what would ultimately be a futile battle: in the end, Williams would drown, choked up by blood and pus. But for now she smiled when Arthur sat by her bed and clasped her remaining hand. Her power armour had been cut from her, but her grip was still tight over his fingers.

“You asked for me,” Arthur somehow managed to keep his voice steady, horrified by the damage. He hadn’t known. All he had heard was that Williams had suffered ‘grave injuries’. “Paladin.”

“Don’t give me that look, sir,” Williams’ voice was hoarse, and racked with gasps. “Should’a… shoulda’ seen what I did to the other guy.”

“Mission accomplished, soldier,” Arthur said, blinking hard; his eyes were starting to sting. “Your strike team destroyed the bunker with the FEV stores.”

“I heard. Seems Danse got himself a field promotion. After digging me out from under the behemoth and setting the charges, then hauling me an’ Ursula out for evac.” 

Arthur nodded slowly. Ursula hadn’t made it either: she had bled out aboard the vertibird. “Paladin-“

“I know. She beat me to it,” Williams chuckled, all low, wet coughs. “That girl, always had’ta be first off the leash. But you still got Danse, Astlin and Ummon. They’re not so bad. They’ll help you… get where you want to go.” 

“I don’t doubt it.” 

“Wish I could be there to see it,” Williams squeezed Arthur’s hand. “But I think this is my stop, sir. Sorry.” 

“You’ve done more than I could have hoped for,” Arthur squeezed back, breathing carefully, easing back tears. He would _not_ break in public. Ever again. “Rest easy now, Paladin.” 

“Ad Victoriam, sir. Give’m hell,” Williams whispered. 

Arthur patted her hand, swallowing hard, and got up from his seat. The survivors of Williams’ company had already packed into the little ward, and he couldn’t meet their eyes, fleeing as quickly as dignity allowed. At sixteen, he had just begun to edge into his growth spurt, but he was still slender and short enough to look like a squire from a distance, and as such Arthur managed to slip away without much notice. Technically, he was meant to be at the AFB anyway.

Danse found him in the loft, staring out at the Bailey, hands pressed against the sill. Arthur had surprised himself with his grief. He hadn’t really known Williams that well: she was one out of several of field ops Paladins whose teams had been handed over to Arthur for command. 

“She’s gone,” Danse said gently.

“Go away,” Arthur growled, turning his face away so that Danse wouldn’t see his reddened eyes. 

“This again, sir?” 

“This time I actually outrank you,” Arthur scowled, and to his annoyance, Danse ignored the order, getting up onto the ground and walking over, drawing Arthur into a hug. Arthur stiffened, indignant. Danse was over a head taller than Arthur and broader, _bigger_ all round, immovable even when Arthur squirmed and growled. Eventually he gave up, furious.

“Better now sir?”

“No! Let _go_ of me.” 

Danse patted Arthur’s back instead. “It’s all right. We would’ve done it again if we had to. We had to destroy those stores.” 

Arthur was about to snap that he was going to call Danse up on an insubordination charge, but what he actually ended up saying was, “She died because of me!” 

“She isn’t the first,” Danse said gently, “And she won’t be the last. We _all_ die eventually, sir. But those of us who die a death that’s worthwhile - one that has _purpose_? A life lived with purpose has no room for despair. And you’ve given that to us - don’t you see? Purpose.”

Arthur turned his face against Danse’s uniform, and took in a shaky breath, a lungful of clean starch and the faint scent of sweat and something masculine, earthier. He let himself be soothed. When was the last time someone had held him like this, _touched_ him, to give comfort? Arthur couldn’t remember. Even his memories of his parents were dim, and never quite seemed happy. Neither of his parents had any time for a child who had been born reserved and shy. 

“Going to war with the Outcasts will be costly,” Arthur said quietly.

“Very likely, sir.” 

“High Command thinks it’s a waste of time. I know that they’re hoping that I’ll fail. They only gave me the Prydwen because Ingram told them that the Outcasts had nothing that could seriously damage it.”

“With all respect sir,” Danse said wryly, “Those of us under your command don’t care what High Command thinks. Paladin Liev’s company was the one that found and retrieved the nuclear core from Rivet City-“ 

Arthur pulled away, and this time, Danse let him. “That’s not what I wanted either,” he said, frustrated, glaring out at the Bailey. “I want the Brotherhood _united_. This rift between the field officers and the others? It’s just as damaging as the one between the Outcasts and us.” 

“Then give the others something to believe in,” Danse suggested quietly. 

_Purpose_. That was the key. The Brotherhood of Steel was effectively an army, and an army without a war was like an ouroboros, eating its own tail. For unity, there had to be war.

“I heard that one of the Paladins was investigating synths in the Capital Wasteland,” Arthur recalled, thoughtful now.

“Yes sir. Paladin Brandis. His company’s out on a fuel run.” 

“I’m returning to Adams to oversee the Prydwen’s preparations. Send Brandis to me when he returns. I have a special mission for him.”

3.0.

The current leader of the Outcasts, Teagan, was a swaggering, gruff man who had been a Star Paladin when the Outcasts had seceded from the Brotherhood. His hair and beard were silver and fading, but neatly trimmed, and to Danse’s annoyance, he arrived at the cease fire in power armour, fully armed.

They were near Rivet City, on technically neutral ground, in an overgrown field that had once been some sort of picnic ground. Maxson sat at a picnic bench, straight-backed, imperious, and didn’t seem in the least intimidated when the small party of Outcasts arrived, some even defiantly cradling their rifles. Teagan clanked over to a stop before the picnic table, and pulled off his helmet. 

“This is a cease fire,” Danse said, glancing pointedly at the heavy Gauss rifle slung at Teagan’s back.

“You don’t see me shooting, do you?” Teagan drawled. “This is me, ceasing fire.” Danse started to object, but Maxson held up a hand, and he subsided. 

“Thanks for agreeing to meet,” Maxson said, his tone neutral. 

Teagan grunted. “Fuck me, you’re even tinier than I thought you would be. I remember you, kid. When they brought you in from the West Coast by vertibird you were snivelling all the way into the Citadel. Missed your mommy, I think it was.”

“Everyone grows up sometime,” Maxson noted indifferently, even as Danse bristled. 

“So I’ve heard. Apparently you killed a deathclaw while you were thirteen and then a super mutant master when you were fifteen?” Teagan spat on the ground, to his left. “What d’you think we are, stupid? Maybe you should make all your cute little stories a little less cute, huh?”

“I don’t care what you believe,” Maxson said quietly. “I’ve captured your main supply outpost and maimed your sentry bot workshop. Frankly, that’s as far as I really wanted to go.”

“Got tired of trading blows already? Pity.”

“If I wanted to destroy you I could,” Maxson disagreed evenly. “But I don’t want to. As I told you from the beginning, I want the Outcasts to return to the Brotherhood.”

“Yeah. We heard you the first time, kid.” Teagan rolled his eyes. “Look. Taking out the Enclave, that was good. Killing the Shepherd - however that was really done - sure. But don’t think that we don’t know what’s going on in the Brotherhood. It’s a CATFU up in High Command, yeah?”

“That doesn’t matter,” Maxson narrowed his eyes. “Someday _I_ will be High Command.” 

“Ha!” Teagan smirked. “You’ve got the name for it, at least. Nice to dream big. That what you want? Us to return with you so that you can get a big shiny promotion?”

“I don’t care about promotions. What do you know about the Institute?” 

Teagan glanced to his side, and after a moment’s hesitation, the Outcast he was looking at pulled his helmet off, revealing a bald, dark-skinned man with hard eyes. “Kells?”

“Rumours. Seems they’re probably further out. In the Commonwealth, maybe. Might’ve been what happened to the CIT. There was something about it in the old ‘Pentagon’ records. They make synths.” 

“We’ve received some reports from deep run tech teams in the Commonwealth. The Institute does worse than that. The settlers believe that they kidnap people. Replace them with synths. They sent a synth to murder a peace summit of settlers. It’s obvious that whatever and wherever this Institute is, they present a clear and present threat to humanity.” 

Teagan looked surprised, and glanced back over at Kells, who shrugged in his power armour. “Confirms some of the wilder rumours.” 

“We still need to find the Institute. I’ve sent another recon team to the Commonwealth. But in the meantime, this is why I want the Outcasts to return. I don’t care why you left. I don’t even care what you’ve done in the meantime. I’m preparing for war. The most significant war that the Brotherhood has ever begun.”

There was a long silence, then Teagan exhaled, and let out a chuckle. “Can’t really figure out whether you’re crazy or really fuckin’ crazy.” 

“And I,” Maxson shot back, “Can’t figure out why you’d want to remain as you are. Living like raiders. Names struck from the Codex. Only old grievances and a different coat of paint on your power armour to keep you going. When the Outcasts die out? You’ll all fade from history. _I_ remember you, Star Paladin Teagan. You were part of the team that found Liberty Prime, that cleared the Black Dog tribes from the Falls Church territory. Seems a shame for all that to be forgotten.” 

“Getting lectured by a beardless kid whose balls probably haven’t even dropped,” Teagan shook his head. “This was a waste of time.” 

“If you like.” Maxson rose from the table, and Danse was amused to see that Teagan nearly took a step back. “That’s all I wanted to say to the lot of you. Come back and help me write history itself. Or fall by the wayside and be forgotten.”

IV.

“I don’t want to send you,” Arthur said resentfully, and Danse laughed, warm breath ghosting out over Arthur’s belly. They were curled on Arthur’s bed in the Citadel - or at least, Arthur was curled on the bed, and Danse was wedged precariously between Arthur’s thighs, one knee braced on the floor. Even in the Elder’s private chambers, the beds weren’t made for two.

“Who else are you going to send to the Commonwealth, then?” 

Arthur grumbled under his breath as Danse kissed lazily downwards, following the scattering of dark hair that flecked his stomach down to his pelvis. They were naked, sweat cooling on their skin, already past the first frantic round, filth wet on their bellies. This had seemed so wrong only a month ago, so much like a betrayal of trust, of Danse’s open devotion and loyalty. Now, as Danse started to lick up the spend on Arthur’s skin, slow and worshipful, Arthur wasn’t sure why he hadn’t tried this earlier. 

“Maybe Ummon,” Arthur pretended to consider, and Danse snorted, not even pausing for long. “Liev, maybe.”

“Ummon’s not suited for long hauls, and Liev’s growing old.” Danse leaned back just enough to kiss Arthur on the tip of his cock. “You can’t keep me here just because you want me in your bed, sir.” He smiled with mock innocence up at Arthur, and licked a stripe, wetly, up Arthur’s stiffening cock. Creator, but Danse was _handsome_. 

“I’m the Elder now and I can do what I want,” Arthur said, an argument that he could only use when alone with Danse, and only because it hardly ever worked. Outside this room, Arthur had to be forbidding, fiercely driven, the living legend, larger than life. The new fit of his life sometimes grew uneasy, and the man who grounded him was right here. Only when Arthur looked at Danse did he permit himself to remember the child he had once been. Carefully, almost tenderly, he pressed his fingers up against Danse’s forehead, pushing back the curling strands of his fringe. 

Danse chuckled and gave him another lick. “Well then, Elder, where do you want me?” 

“Get up here, Paladin,” Arthur growled, and Danse obeyed, pulling himself up and leaning over. Arthur chased the bitter spend of his own taste in Danse’s mouth, curled his fingers around the nape of Danse’s neck to hold him still. Maybe he was being possessive, to keep Danse by his side. Selfish. But a man as beautiful as Danse easily inspired selfishness. 

Danse was still loose from the morning, and the strangled sound he made against Arthur’s neck as Arthur pressed slick fingers into him was wounded, the way he cant his hips up eagerly into the pressure, gratifying. With anyone else, Arthur would’ve started to second-guess himself, would’ve wondered if his surname was all that his lover was chasing, but the worshipful, awed way Danse mouthed against Arthur’s neck and whispered _Arthur_ against his pulse burned all doubt away. Danse had been there from the beginning, when Arthur was nothing but a squire with a big name and little to show for it. Danse was here now, one of his most loyal and effective field officers, his devotion unquestionable. And he would be there at the end, Arthur decided, by Arthur’s right hand, when Arthur eventually took his birthright - the High Elder’s seat. 

Powerful thighs wrapped against Arthur’s flanks, heels digging insistently into his back as he pushed into wet, tight heat, felt the trembling flutter of Danse’s heartbeat against him, pressed flesh to flesh, Danse’s cock thickened and caught between their bellies. When they were like this, entwined, there was no space for anything less than wonder. Devotion as a sentiment was ultimately corrosive: worship tended to flow both ways. Arthur kissed Danse as he started to roll his hips, slow, greedy for the pleas that Danse pressed against him, the low, shocked exhalations of dazed pleasure. Drowning like this felt like a welcome breed of damnation. 

When Danse spilled between them it was always noisy, Arthur’s name wrung from him into a wail, his usual gentle, grave poise shattering in spectacular motion. Arthur buried his own ecstasy, himself, eyes closed, teeth sunk hard into Danse’s shoulder, his arm, his neck, once. Today he bit Danse hard over a bicep, where he knew the press of shoulder plating would push against Danse’s skin, and lapped at the bruise as it formed. 

“I want to go because we haven’t heard from Brandis for a while,” Danse said later, as they lay on the cot together, an uncomfortable fit, too close, too warm. 

“Is this because of Knight Astlin?” Arthur asked, a little resentful. 

Danse stared at him, for a long moment, then he smiled, rueful and amused. “Yes it is, in fact. But not the way that you’re thinking. But more than that. We do have to find the Institute.”

They did, but not quite in the way that Danse was thinking, either. The reintegration of the Outcasts had been fractious, and it had been four years, now. The war had not yet begun. And although Kells and Teagan were respectful - barely - Arthur knew that the cracks would start again, all too soon. 

“All right,” Arthur said, reluctantly. “Pick a good team. And radio back if you find anything. Even if it’s just an anomaly.”

“I will.” Danse kissed Arthur on the forehead, worshipful again, then lower, against the scar that puckered his cheek. “See you on the other side, Elder.” 

“Good hunting.” _And come back to me_ , Arthur added silently, in his head, where he could be selfish still. Maybe Danse heard him. The kiss tickled lower, until it was pressed against his mouth.

4.0.

“You’re _certain_ that you want to sponsor her into the Brotherhood,” Arthur repeated dubiously, when Nora had wandered off to explore the ship. She cut a strange sight among the Brotherhood, small, nearly petite, with lustrous dark hair worn loose over a beautifully cut silver-gray coat and scarf. But for the rifle she wore slung across her back, Nora would’ve looked like an old-world model, right out of a mag. If you didn’t look into her eyes.

“Nora’s a civilian, but she’s promising.” Danse assured Arthur. “I was a dirty Wastelander too once,” he added dryly, when Arthur sniffed. “And you heard her. She’s not exactly a Wastelander either.”

“That’s what worries me. If she’s telling the truth, she’s from an utterly different world altogether. I’m surprised that she isn’t more shocked.”

“Said she got all the ‘screaming and denial and crying’ out of her system a week ago.” 

“She said she was a ‘lawyer’. What is that?” 

“No idea, sir.” Nora had laughed until she had to sit down and catch her breath when Danse had asked her the same question. ‘A world without lawyers!’ she had repeated to herself under her breath, chuckling each time. It was possible that Nora was not entirely stable. 

Arthur mulled this over. “You’ve said that she’s combat capable. Maybe it was some sort of old-world civilian corps. But… ‘screaming and crying’?” 

Still, Danse couldn’t quite imagine Nora doing any ‘screaming and denial’: there was something far too dignified about her, generally, too reserved, almost cold. “She’s looking for her son. As far as we know, he’s still only a baby. The Institute murdered her husband and stole the child before her eyes.”

Arthur grimaced, disgusted. “Each time I think the Institute can’t stoop any lower… Go with her,” he added. “Try and help her. Whatever plans that the Institute might have for a baby… a child that young must be returned to its mother.”

Danse nodded. “I thought so.” 

“Did you see her eyes?” Arthur turned away, glancing back out of the viewport. “She has the look of… I think she’ll burn the world down, to get her son back.” 

“I’ve seen that look before,” Danse said wryly, dropping his tone. “There was this boy I met once. He had the same look in his eyes, killing a super mutant master with a pistol… telling off the Outcasts for being short-sighted-“ 

“Dismissed, Paladin,” Arthur said sharply, flushing a little, then added, almost hurriedly. “See me later tonight.” 

Danse caught up with Nora in the mess hall, where she was bent, hands on her knees, talking to one of the squires. When Danse approached, heavy in his combat armour, the squire excused himself quickly and fled, and Nora straightened up. She was frowning now, and she motioned him over, heading out to a quieter section of the corridors. 

“Did you see that boy?” Nora whispered, in a low hiss. “He told me he was looking forward to going out on patrol! To shoot super mutants and synths!”

“He’s a squire,” Danse said mildly. “They all receive combat training in the field.” 

Nora’s eyebrows rose. “He can’t have been older than ten.”

“Probably. They can be anywhere between ten to seventeen.”

“And they _all_ go out ‘in the field’?” Nora asked, incredulous. “Get taught how to kill?” 

“Part of their preparation for life in the Brotherhood. Elder Maxson made his own first confirmed kills when he was twelve.” 

“Twelve!” Nora blinked. “Good Lord. And you don’t see anything wrong with that?”

“They’re taught to defend themselves,” Danse pointed out. “This isn’t the world that you’re used to, Nora. Here, life is harder. Even for the young.” 

“It doesn’t _have_ to be. The Brotherhood… surely it doesn’t have to use child soldiers,” Nora shook her head slowly, wearily. “My God. No wonder some of you are such…” she swallowed the rest of her words, clenching her fists. Danse waited, uncertain whether he should tell Nora off or stay silent. She was always brittle after having to talk about her son, and speaking to Arthur about it had clearly been difficult as it is. 

“Never mind,” Nora said finally, as though to herself. “I’ll make a deal with the Devil himself if it’d take me a step closer to my son.” 

_She’ll burn the world down_. Danse nodded, suddenly uneasy. “We’ll find him,” he assured her, and Nora stared at her feet for a moment too long before glancing back up at him, with a smile that seemed practiced. 

“Of course we will. Now. Were you going to give me that tour?” 

“This way,” Danse decided. Maybe it was just his nerves. And besides, he had a proper reunion to look forward to, later in the evening. It had been a long time coming, but the world was finally setting itself to rights.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!  
> \--  
> Final notes:
> 
> 1\. super mutants all feel like orcs to me  
> 2\. also - Damn did puberty hit Arthur hard. Hard and long. ;) I totally did not recognise him until I saw it come up on the wiki. WTF.  
> 3\. title is from: Delta Rae: Bottom of the River  
> 4\. camping somewhere up high and slowly plinking deathclaws to death = my go-to method in Fallout 3, since I stupidly specced for big guns  
> 5\. while writing this fic I realized that Squire rank is actually above Initiate rank, and Squires go out on combat missions :o which makes Maxson pretty much a child soldier… … which might explain a little of why he seems to come off as a hyperaggressive asshole… anyway, my refs for this fic:  
> http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/12/09/for-child-soldiers-every-day-is-a-living-nightmare/  
> http://www.newsweek.com/2013/07/31/when-liberian-child-soldiers-grow-237780.html  
> \--  
> twitter: manic_intent  
> tumblr: manic-intent


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